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<br /> <br />-::J <br />":) <br />" <br />'" <br />N <br />--:I <br /> <br />. <br /> <br />. <br /> <br />Statement of <br />Wallace A. Gieringer, Chairman for Arkansas <br />Arkansas River aasin Interstate Committee <br />to <br />the Chairman of the Energy and Water Development Subcommittee <br />Appropriations Committee <br /> <br />United States Senate <br />***** <br /> <br />U, S. House of Representatives <br /> <br />Relative to Appropriation for the Comprehensive Development <br />of the Arkansas River Basin for FY 86 <br /> <br />Mr, Chairman and members of the Committee, my name is Wallace Gieringer, I <br />serve as Executive Director of the Pine Bluff-Jefferson County Port <br />Authority and Arkansas Chairman of the Interstate Committee. Other <br />Committee members representing Arkansas are Messrs. Wayne Bennett, farmer <br />from Lonoke; Charles Maynard, banker from Little Rock; Douglas W. Parker, <br />attorney from Fort Smith; and Charles L. Steel, electric utility executive <br />from Little Rock. We fully endorse the statement presented to you today by <br />the Chairman of the Arkansas River Basin Interstate Committee. <br /> <br />The Arkansas Committee recognizes and appreciates your concern and the <br />Administration's concern for needed fiscal responsibility. We are however, <br />alarmed and fear that the Administration's current proposals for increases <br />in cost-sharing for the inland waterways call for an unqualified <br />across-ths-board recovery level that, if imposed, will cause the demise of <br />barge and towing industry - and indeed the inland waterway system. <br /> <br />Administration waterway cost-sharing proposals are expected to skew the <br />country's system of transportation in favor of the least efficient, the <br />least economical. and the most wasteful forms of transportation. Any gain <br />in federal revenues would surely be offset soon enough by the waste of fuel, <br />the loss of efficiency, and the damage to economic growth, <br /> <br />We strongly believe federal water resource investments serve as "investment <br />seeds" which are a catalyst for self-sustaining investment of private <br />capital in achieving long-term economic growth, Let us identify certain <br />projects vital to the economic well-being of our area, We recommend: <br /> <br />* all funding for the Corps of Engineers which has been included in <br />the President's budget; <br /> <br />* continuation of authority for the Arkansas River Navigation <br />Project; <br /> <br />* appropriation of funds necessary to repair damages incurred at Dam <br />2 of the McClellan-Kerr Arkansas River Navigation System resulting <br />from the December 1982 flood; <br /> <br />* funding to continue the needed "Arkansas River, Arkansas and <br />Oklahoma Municipal, Industrial and Agricultural Water Supply <br />Study"; <br /> <br />5 <br />